Robert Stein (1950)

Robert Stein (1972)

Robert Stein (2000s)

About Me

editor, publisher, media critic and journalism teacher,
is a former Chairman of the American Society of Magazine Editors, and author of “Media Power: Who Is Shaping Your Picture of the World?” Before the war in Iraq, he wrote in The New York Times: “I see a generation gap in the debate over going to war in Iraq. Those of us who fought in World War II know there was no instant or easy glory in being part of 'The Greatest Generation,' just as we knew in the 1990s that stock-market booms don’t last forever.
We don’t have all the answers, but we want to spare our children and grandchildren from being slaughtered by politicians with a video-game mentality."
This is not meant to extol geezer wisdom but suggest that, even in our age of 24/7 hot flashes, something can be said for perspective.
The Web is a wide space for spreading news, but it can also be a deep well of collective memory to help us understand today’s world. In olden days, tribes kept village elders around to remind them with which foot to begin the ritual dance. Start the music.

Saturday, June 22, 2013

GOP Loopy Latino Lovers

Republicans wooing Hispanics are
looking like stiff old men on “Dancing with the Stars,” awkward, embarrassing
and tripping themselves into unnatural postures to scale up border walls and land
on pathways to citizenship.

Mitt Romney’s thumping among minorities last year persuaded GOP naysayers that 2016 would be about “complexions and elections,” but the stretch from who-the-hell-are-these-people to benvenidos-hermanos is proving to be as
long as 700 miles of fence with 19,000 more border cops abetted by drones to
tons of paperwork for getting on the back of the line, paying a fine and
earning citizenship.

Leading the charge for all
these charges is the Republican Great Brown Hope Marco Rubio, abetted by a
couple of Senate compadresfrom North
Dakota and Tennessee, John Hoeven and Bob Corker, with few Latino constituents
but a strong itch to get on the national stage.

Never mind that their border
security will cost $30 billion dollars
at a time when roads and bridges are crumbling everywhere else, but it will
help Tea Party patriots sleep better with a promise to be 90 percent effective
in stopping illegals, a figure Democrats call a pipedream.

In his Weekly Address, the President admits "the bill isn’t perfect. It’s a compromise. Nobody is going to get
everything they want – not Democrats, not Republicans, not me. But it’s
consistent with the principles that I and others have laid out for
commonsense reform. That’s why Republicans and Democrats, CEOs and
labor leaders, are saying that now is the time to pass this bill. If
you agree with us, reach out to your Senators and Representatives. Tell
them that the time for excuses is over; it’s time to fix our broken
immigration system once and for all."

Those of us who know
first-hand the struggles and privations that European immigrant parents had to
overcome to achieve the American Dream for their children have heartfelt
compassion for these new generations striving to climb into the Great Melting
Pot.

The obstacles back then were
many, but they never included two-faced politicians reaching out a helping hand
with hidden zappers.